CALIFORI 



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GRADUATIN 




ARTHUR A 



1922 



PUBLISHED BY THE INSTITUTE 
JUNE. 1922 



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VOLUME XXXI 



NUMBER 95 



BULLETIN 
OF THE 

CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE 

OF 

TECHNOLOGY 



ADDRESS 

TO THE 

GRADUATING CLASS OF 1922 

BY 
ARTHUR A. NOYES 



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PUBLISHED BY THE INSTITUTE 
JUNE. 1922 



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THE CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY BULLETIN 
IS PUBLISHED FOUR TIMES EACH YEAR 



ENTERED AT THE POST OFFICE. PASADENA. CALIFORNIA. UNDER 
ACT OF CONGRESS. AS MAIL MATTER OF THE SECOND CLASS 



THP96-024834 




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KhhuBB to % O^raittattttg (Elaaa 

By Arthur A. Noyes 

Members of the Graduating Class : 

I desire first of all to express our disappointment 
that Dr. Millikan, the Chairman of the Executive 
Council, cannot be present here today to speak to you 
and to confer the degrees ; but he has written you a 
letter of congratulation, received only yesterday, which 
you will permit me to read to you. 

To the Members of the Class of 1922 of the California 
Institute of Technology: 

It is a source of great regret to me that I cannot be 
present upon Commencement Day to assist in bidding you 
Godspeed as you start out to meet the problems of life, for 
which the Institute has sought to prepare you. That prepara- 
tion has been in large part your own ; but you are also in part 
the product of your surroundings, and for that reason the 
Institute will be judged by the records which you make in 
life, its success depending upon your success, and its reputa- 
tion upon your reputation as men of ability and worth. May 
this sense of a mutual responsibility always keep you and the 
Institute close together, and may it inspire both you and 
the Institute to the best efforts. 

As I have been observing in Europe the difficulty with 
which changes can be made in surroundings which are hoary 
with tradition, I become more and more convinced that the 
most priceless possession in the world is youth and the oppor- 
tunity which comes with it. It is a possession which both 
you and the Institute have. May both you and the Institute 
use that youth for creating a background out of which the 
fullest, finest type of American manhood may grow. 

Faithfully yours, 

R. A. Millikan. 

I wish also to extend to you the hearty congratula- 
tions of the Trustees and Faculty on the accomplish- 
ment of the result for which you have successfully 
striven. You are to be congratulated not so much 
because the diploma which I shall soon have the plea- 
sure of presenting to each of you certifies to the com- 
pletion of a severe course of study and to the acquire- 
ment of much liberal and professional knowledge, as 



because it implies that you possess the qualities of mind 
and character that are essential to the highest success 
in life — a willingness to subordinate pleasure to duty, 
a determination to accomplish what has been deliber- 
ately undertaken, and an integrity of mind which will 
not contentedly accept as final, imperfect or inexact 
results. 

The award to you of the degree implies, too, that 
you have formed sound habits of work that cannot fail 
to be of prime importance to you in your subsequent 
careers. As one of our greatest American psychol- 
ogists, William James, has said : *'The man who has 
daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention, 
energetic exercise of will, and self-denial in unneces- 
sary things will stand like a tower when everything 
rocks around him, and when his softer fellow-mortals 
are winnowed like chaff in the blast." 

The Institute curriculum is not so exacting as to 
preclude a reasonable participation in the affairs of 
student life ; but there has been here no opportunity for 
that undue predominance of the physical and social 
activities over the intellectual which characterizes the 
student life of many colleges — a condition which led 
President Wilson to say that the classrooms and the 
laboratories had become the side shows, and the 
athletic field the main ring of the University. 

You need not now "turn over a new leaf." You do 
not now have to close a collegiate period of idleness or 
frivolity with good resolutions of reformation for the 
future and with a new determination to pursue your 
work with seriousness of purpose and with the aim of 
high accomplishment. You have taken these resolu- 
tions long ago, and have already developed the qualities 
necessary for the fulfilment ; else you would not be here 
today. 

Most important for you to realize is perhaps the 
fact that it is to be your main function to do new things, 
not merely carry on old things in old ways. Some of 
you, as civil engineers, are to create new structures — 
new highways, bridges, subways, and tunnels for facili- 
tating transportation, new factories and office build- 
ings for the promotion of industry, new reservoirs, 
aqueducts, and sewers for the better sanitation of cities 
and the development of water power. Others of you, 



as mechanical and electrical engineers, are to provide 
for nezv pozver, its development or transmission, or are 
to devise and construct machines for the saving of 
labor in the manufacture of products for electric light- 
ing, or for use in telephony. Still others of you, as 
chemists and chemical engineers, are to deal directly 
with the production of new materials or of old mate- 
rials by new processes. All of you will attain highest 
success by doing new things of a creative character — 
always considering whether standardized or routine 
methods cannot be improved upon. 

One of your most important opportunities in this 
direction will be that of avoiding economic waste — 
waste of power through imperfect machines, waste of 
materials through unscientific processes, waste of time 
and effort through inadequate structures and transpor- 
tation facilities. 

Your training thus opens to you an unusual oppor- 
tunity for service to the community ; and service is the 
keynote of the spirit of this twentieth century. 

In politics the old idea, ''to the victor belongs the 
spoils," is giving place to the principle that "public 
office is a public trust." 

In business a higher code of ethics prevails : de- 
structive competition is being replaced by co-operative 
effort ; corporations are endeavoring to render better 
public service, adopting as their motto, "The public be 
pleased," in place of the profane epigram of a few 
years ago. 

In education, it is no longer thought sufficient to 
impart the social, literary, and artistic accomplishments 
of the gentleman, but every youth must be fitted for 
some form of service. 

In religious teaching, what has been called "other- 
worldliness" is disappearing — the hope of future re- 
ward or the fear of future punishment is no longer 
emphasized. 

The science of ethics is no longer necessarily based 
on the greatest happiness of the greatest number as its 
fundamental postulate. The advance of science and 
especially the establishment of the great principle of 
evolution have brought us to a clearer appreciation of 
our relation to the universe and to a higher conception 
of our obligations. It is no longer for our own ends, 

6 



whether in this world or another, that we are to work. 
We realize that we are at an intermediate stage in the 
process of development. We know that "man will 
grow from more to more" — that our present type is 
but the ''herald of a higher race." ''We doubt not, 
through the ages one increasing purpose runs" ; and 
we strive to further the accomplishment of that pur- 
pose, which, so far as we can understand it in relation 
to ourselves has for its end the fuller development of 
the finest manhood and of the higher human faculties. 
This is the basic principle of evolutionary ethics. 

The question for each of us is, therefore. How can 
we make the largest, most permanent contribution to 
the welfare of mankind ? In the words of the 'M. 1. T. 
song, 

"Let each in his chosen place, 
Beat out on the anvil of human toil, 
The good of the human race." 

If we foUov/ this as our guiding principle, we need 
have no fear of failure in our life-work, even if it be 
judged from such other viewpoints as the attainment 
of happiness, or of pubHc recognition, or of personal 
influence. 

With these few words of congratulation and en- 
couragement for the future, I enter upon the pleasant 
task of distributing to you the diplomas of your grad- 
uation. 

[The diplomas were then presented to the individ- 
ual members of the graduating class.] 

It gives me now much pleasure to extend to you as 
Doctors, Masters, or Bachelors of Science the greetings 
of the Trustees and Faculty and of your friends, and 
to assure you of the interest of your teachers in your 
future welfare and of their best wishes for success in 
the work you are soon to undertake. There will always 
be a cordial welcome for you within these halls ; and, 
in now saying a final farewell to you as a class, it is 
our hope that it may be only a temporary one to you 
as individuals. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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